GOSH Consultants Attend Virtual Conference, Abu Dhabi
Last week, Professor Ajay Vora, Dr Sara Ghorashian and Dr Anupama Rao, Consultant Paediatric Haematologists at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH), attended ‘3rd Emirates Pediatric Hematology & Oncology Conference’, Virtual Conference, Abu Dhabi. As a globally renowned children’s hospital, treating the rarest and most complex conditions, these specialists at GOSH decided to share their expert knowledge to “give a unique opportunity for teaching and training paediatric specialists working in the Gulf countries” as Professor Ajay Vora explains.
Acute leukaemia is the most common form of cancer in children, accounting for 25-30% of all cases. At the conference, Professor Vora shared some tips on when general paediatricians should suspect leukaemia in children, how to manage symptoms and signs of leukaemia, and he discussed investigations to confirm diagnosis.
Professor Vora has a special interest in childhood leukaemia and cord blood transplantation. He has also taken a leading role in clinical trials in childhood Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) and haemopoietic stem cell transplantation both nationally and internationally.
He says that participating in this conference will “improve the quality and care of referred patients prior to their coming to GOSH for further therapy”.
Dr Sara Ghorashian is involved in the implementation of new studies to improve outcomes for children with high-risk or relapsed acute leukaemia. In 2019 Dr Ghorashian was involved in treating the first NHS paediatric patient in the UK with a new ground-breaking treatment, known as Kymriah, for relapsed ALL. Kymriah is a type of immunotherapy called CAR-T therapy which modifies a patient’s immune system cells, known as T cells, to attack the cancer cells. Since 2019 Dr Ghorashian has successfully treated several international patients with relapsed ALL, including Tamin from Saudi Arabia. Indeed, at GOSH 17 patients have received treatment with CAR-T cell therapy just this year.
At the conference, Dr Ghorashian presented her knowledge on understanding licensed indications for ALL CAR-T cell therapy with Kymriah, understanding how to best prepare a patient for CAR-T cell therapy and further how to manage a patient following their CAR-T cell therapy treatment.
Dr Anupama Rao, a member of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, Royal College of Pathologists, British Society of Haematology and the Childhood Cancer and Leukaemia Group, also presented at the conference. She is an expert at providing care for children with rare haematological disease, and improving long-term outcomes for children with rare diseases to ensure they lead long and healthy lives.
At GOSH, our consultants are dedicated to advocating for high quality specialist paediatric care everywhere in the world. This can be seen through their attendance at virtual conferences, allowing them to work together with international colleagues to share knowledge and experience for the benefit of all children.
